Mabel's Mistake Part 54

"But the cold!"

"It is nothing, with cus.h.i.+ons and plenty of buffalo robes. An hour will take you safely into the city. I must be let out on the way, and get home on foot. Come, are you ready?"

"In a moment--in a moment!" answered Zillah, gathering up her furs, and putting on a warm hood. "But, how can we get her dressed and out to the sleigh? Her clothes are like ice; they were absolutely frozen down!"

"Here, here!" cried Agnes, going into the inner room, and coming forth with some dark garments across her arms; "fortunately, I left these things at home. We must get them on, as she sleeps. There is no fear of waking her, I suppose?"

"No, no! Make haste, if it must be to-night!"

The two women lifted Lina from her couch upon the floor; arranged her in the garments that Agnes had selected; and, wrapping her in a large cloak, bore her between them out to a sleigh that had been drawn up near the house.

The driver appeared quite prepared for the singular appearance of a girl evidently insensible, for he flung back the fur robes without any appearance of curiosity; and, when the women had taken their places, drove away as rapidly as the drifted snow would permit.

CHAPTER LXI.

STRANGE PLANS.

When Lina awoke, she was alone in a chamber that seemed both unfamiliar and unpleasant, though sumptuous objects met her on every side. The atmosphere was stifling, as if some pastilles had just been burned in it, and a heavy pain in the head flung a mistiness all around. She was surprised to find herself dressed in garments strange as the room; but the heavy aching of all her limbs, and the glow of coming fever in her cheek, rendered connected thought impossible. She dropped asleep again, but only to be aroused by a soft tread that stole through her room, and the breath of some person bending downward, which made her shudder, as if it had been the poison of a upas tree floating across her mouth.

"Are you better, Lina? are you awake?"

"Who speaks?" cried the girl, starting wildly up. "Where am I--and who calls me Lina?"

"It is your mother who speaks--it is her house that shelters you."

"My mother? oh, Father of Heaven! now I remember: take me hence--take me hence!"

"My child," said the woman Zillah, stepping out from the curtains that had half concealed her; "let me look into your eyes, and see if they dare turn in scorn or rebukingly from mine. Sit up, girl, and let me read your face!"

"I cannot, I cannot; my head reels--my heart aches with a pain that will never go away;" cried the poor girl, bending forward and striving to shut out the woman's face with both her clasped hands. "G.o.d help me; I would rather die now!"

The woman went softly up to that excited young creature, and, placing one hand on her forehead, pressed her gently back upon the pillow from which she had started so wildly.

"I am your mother. Look at me--I am your mother!"

Lina lifted her feverish eyes, and looked in that face, so repulsive and yet so beautiful, with a strained, wild gaze, that burned with a brilliancy more terrible than fever.

"I do not know you!" she cried, das.h.i.+ng the woman's hands aside. "Let me rest--I do not know you!"

"But, I am your mother."

"Well, go on and tell the whole story!" cried Lina, with insane vehemence. "I know who my father is--he told me himself; but you, madam--you with those strange eyes, and that proud stoop of the head, how came you to be my mother? Don't you know that General Harrington has a wife, and that Ralph is her son. What are you, then, and what am I?"

"I was General Harrington's slave, and you are my daughter. You need not look at me, with those great wondering eyes. I would have broken this more kindly, but you receive me as if I were your slave--not his. You reject me--so be it; but my blood is in your veins, and my shame on your forehead. You cannot shake it off; it will cling around you like a curse, forever and ever. Now sleep if you can!"

A shrill cry broke from the poor young creature, who had fallen forward grovelling in the bed. She struggled to get up, but her limbs were numb, and refused to move. She flung her clasped hands wildly out, and the prayer that she strove to utter broke forth in a sound, that bore with it the last sane thought that she was to know for weeks.

CHAPTER LXII

THE TEMPTATION.

"Gen. Harrington wants to see you!"

A new chambermaid had been introduced into Gen. Harrington's household, and it was this woman who addressed James Harrington as he sat in the remote chamber which had fallen to his lot in a wing of the family mansion.

Harrington looked up as the mulatto presented herself, startled by the southern accent and appearance of the woman, which struck him disagreeably; when she moved away, with her indolent walk and indifferent air, he watched her with a sense of relief of which he was himself unconscious.

"The General am in his own room," she muttered in answer to his question, turning back as she spoke, "something don't seem to 'gree with him somehow this mornin', 'pears like he ain't right well."

The unpleasant impression left by this woman pa.s.sed but partially away; trifles sometimes affect sensitive characters with a feeling of unrest long after the cause is displaced from the memory; disturbed by this shadowy feeling, James arose and sought General Harrington's room, wondering a little in his mind what the business might be which occasioned this unusual request for an interview. He pa.s.sed the mulatto woman in one of the pa.s.sages, who retreated to the wall and stood with her gaze bent on the floor as he pa.s.sed, but the moment his back was turned the sleepy lids rose suddenly from over her black eyes that flamed out with evil pa.s.sions, and a repulsive smile stirred her mouth till it worked like a nest of reptiles. Again an unpleasant sensation crept over James Harrington, and he hurried forward with an unconquerable desire to escape her presence.

He found General Harrington alone, surrounded by the luxurious appointments which distinguished his apartments above all others in the house; but the old man was restless and even pallid, as if some unusual moral force had been necessary to urge on this interview with a man against whom he meditated a temptation so atrocious.

For the first moment these two men stood regarding each other in silence. General Harrington stood up at his visitor's approach, but all his self-possession was insufficient to keep his limbs from trembling and the color from fleeing his face. The painful compression of his lips grew more rigid, and a cold glitter stole into his eyes as they met the calm questioning gaze fixed upon them.

"You desired to speak with me, sir," said James Harrington at length, with that gentle respect which had become a habit of self-control, rather than a genuine impulse of reverence for the man before him.

"Yes, sit down," said the General, with a cold harshness of tone so at variance with his usual bland insincerity, that James Harrington looked at him in grave surprise, as he drew a seat toward the library table.

For a moment there was profound silence between the two; then the General turned stiffly in his chair, placed one hand on a book with broken clasps that lay before him, and spoke. There was something more than bitterness in his voice; it was harsh with poisonous malice.

"Mr. James Harrington, you loved my wife before I married her," he said, with rude abruptness, that made his auditor rise from his chair, pale and aghast.

"Sir, sir!" broke from his white lips.

"Before and since; before and since! Do you understand, sir, your hypocrisy is at last exposed? I say again"----

"Stop!" said James Harrington, lifting his hand with authority, though it shook like an aspen. "Stop, sir; you are dealing with things that only G.o.d himself has power to scrutinize. For my acts, sir, you have a right to arraign me; and there I will answer you with the frankness of a little child, for as childhood they are innocent."

James Harrington stood upright as he spoke, with one arm folded across his chest, guarding the secret which that old man was attempting to wrench from his heart with such ruthless cruelty.

"Innocent!" sneered the old man; "innocent! But I do not blame you, sir!

Among men of honor, it is a gentleman's duty to lie broadly and boldly where a lady's reputation is at stake. You have enough of the Harrington blood in your veins to deny this woman's guilt with sufficient indignation; but I, sir, am not mad or blind enough to believe you."

The very might of his emotions kept James Harrington still as he listened to these scathing words. He sat down very quietly, and gazed into the old man's face, shocked to the soul, yet unable to comprehend the reality of a charge so atrocious.

"Will you explain?" he faltered.

"I have explained sufficiently, sir! You loved the lady, and she"----

"Hus.h.!.+ sir; say what you will of me, but do not dare to utter Mabel Harrington's name in this connection. The angels of Heaven are not more blameless than that woman."